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tv   [untitled]    February 24, 2011 9:30pm-10:00pm PST

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this may be a conservative number. in other cases, the role of the weapon is unclear. according to international standards, international -- electronic weapons should only be used in cases where there could be lethal force. far from minimizing the use of force by police, this is dangerously blurred the lines around what is considered acceptable levels of force. one of our principal concerns is that ceds are increasingly be used in situations where firearms or other weapons would not be an option. they have sometimes been used
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preemptively, at the first sign of even minor resistance. furthermore, our study found that because ceds are often seen as nonlethal, they are often used as a weapon of first rather than last resort. the have become less an alternative to firearms and deadly force, rather than an alternative to less intensive techniques. in the 2008 study, amnesty international found that of the 334 persons who died following ced use, the vast majority of individuals, roughly 90%, or not carrying a weapon of any sort. many did not appear to present a serious threat when they were electroshocked. far from preventing escalation of force, law enforcement agencies are using ceds to
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subdue noncompliant individuals who do not pose a significant threat. they include people who continue to struggle while in restraints, who are intoxicated but not dangerous, or who walked or ran from officers during non-life- threatening incidents. several individuals were shot for failing to comply with demands when there were already incapacitated. some were shocked by more than one officer at a time, for long periods, multiple times. the 2008 report also documents multiple examples of people being shot with ceds for nonviolent interactions with the police. examples include a mentally ill teenager who died after being shocked repeatedly while he was naked and lying on the floor of a jail. a young medical doctor crashed his car after he had an
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epileptic seizure. he was repeatedly shocked at the roadside for refusing to comply with commands. amnesty international considers use of electric shock weapons contrary to international standards that require police to use force only as a last resort, in proportion to the threat posed, and in a matter -- manner designed to minimize pain or injury. we acknowledge the importance of developing less lethal force options to decrease the risk of injury and death inherent in police use of firearms or other impact weapons. amnesty international has serious concerns about the use of electroshock devices in law enforcement, both as regards their safety and potential for misuse. no deaths should occur from international -- from inappropriate levels of police
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force, or from weapons that have not been properly tested or controlled. we applaud the commission adoption of the memphis model of crisis intervention training for the police force as a crucial first step in improving police interactions with mentally ill individuals and reducing unnecessary deaths and injuries. however, we caution the commission against opening a pandora's box, by harming police officers with a weapon that is in our opinion unsafe and prone to overuse. thank you. [applause] >> we have some new commissioners. you said they were not controlled and are untested. can you explain what you mean by that? >> part of the issue that has been documented in our report, which did do a fairly comprehensive survey of the type of medical evidence and other reports out there, is that there
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does not seem to be any independent, comprehensive, unbiased study out there that documents the concerns around tasers. there is still concerns around how people from certain vulnerable populations are affected by the use of tasers. in our report, there were a number of instances documented were perfectly helpful -- healthy individuals ended up killed because of these issues. >> next we have dr. sang, assistant professor of medicine at the cardiology division of ucsf. thank you for presenting today. >> good evening, commissioners. thank you for the invitation, commissioner chan. let me keep this up here.
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by way of introduction, i wear three hats at the university. i am a practicing cardiologist. i also perform research and and a faculty member. -- and am a faculty member. in terms of potential conflicts of interest, i receive significant research grants from the national institutes of health on a comprehensive study of sudden cardiac death. i also have been consulting for taser policy with the governments of british columbia in canada. a lot to do a brief research summary in 10 minutes. i will focus a little bit on our own study, and perhaps address complaint that there is not any independent real world study of pacers -- of tasers.
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this is a situation where, in the operating room, i imprint defibrillators. we shopped in a particular time in the cardiac cycle, inducing circulation. luckily, we have a very effective, 99% effective, antidote to cardiac arrest, which is a bit for bit later -- which is a defibrillator. one is impossible. the other is a widely available, it easily deployed device which is present in airports and other public spaces. the other key fact that i want to highlight is that the timing of the fibrillation is key to survival.
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if you look at 50% survival, you have to shock within two minutes. when it goes to 9 to 10 minutes, survival drops to 10%. it continues to drop as some topically -- asymptotally after that. what are some situations, medical situations in which there is increased risk? if somebody has a cardiac disease, heart failure, high adrenaline, as in situations where somebody is struggling, or someone is in the illicit drugs -- cocaine and methamphetamines decrease of vulnerability to the fibrillation -- to def ibrillation.
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this is someone of a review, so i will breeze through this. we know the effect of tasers increases application. it overcomes voluntary control of muscles. intense pain, obviously. subjects are dazed and immobilized for five to 15 minutes. miscarriages can happen. i injuries, eye ingu -- eye injuries, and other areas of injury. an autopsy can reveal nothing if somebody dies from cardiac arrest from a taser, because it is an electrical event. there can be nothing on the autopsy. there have been some taser animal studies. taser-funded study showed no effect, but they used this simulator rather than the actual
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weapon. three independent studies have shown that there is a distinct risk with taser. taser is applied to this animal model. what about human studies? the real limitation of a human study is to cannot do this in an ethical manner. studies are done in resting, help the police volunteers. no capture of the heart. another independent study, a prisoner who happen to have a pacemaker -- taser read at the time a [unintelligible] now we come to my particular study, which was peer reviewed and published in january 2009. we set out to ask the question.
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in the real world, how do tasers impact these outcomes? when you bring in a taser, does it increase rate of sudden death? does it affect officer injuries? the affect people before shooting? does it really bring these things down? we had over 100 california agencies deploying the taser. 90 replied. 80 complied. 50 supplied data to us. i would contrast that to the first study, which had only seven studies and compared nine cities. the other important research design methodology issue is that the proper selection of controls -- i will borrow a matter earlier, which was apples to oranges. when you compare cities to
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different cities, there can be unmeasured effects like crime rates, population size, and demographics. we took every single city and they each for their own control. we look at measures five years before and five years after. all the variables are controlled for when you use the same city as their own control. this is the major point of the study, which is rates of in- custody deaths increased sixfold in first year of taser use. shortly after the publication of the study was when taser finally admitted to this risk of sudden death. also, i believe there rate of one cardiac arrest per 100,000 comes from our study. i will tell you why that is a misleading attribution. when you look on the y axis, these are sudden deaths per 100,000 arrests. arrests does not mean the taser
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was used. even before tasers were used, sudden deaths were happening. as we saw here, the rate of sudden death before tasers were used was on average 1 per 100 -- 1 per 100,000 arrests. that increased to six sudden deaths per 100,000 arrests. it did come down to 1.4 per 100,000 after that first year of deployment. explanations are severalfold. initially, police departments using the taser had much more liberal policy about using the taser. as there was recognition of risk, policies were put forth that dampened that use of taser s and that mitigated some of that risk. if tasers were to be brought, we
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want to prevent that 600% increase in seven deaths and not have that increase. i will point out that after the tasers were used, it did not come back to baseline. it came back to 40% above that baseline. 50 cities provided data for the study. the other question we asked was how about shootings. do they go down? about 20 cities replied. we found about six shootings per 100,000 arrests, which doubled in that first year of taser use. it came back near the baseline after that first year. but shooting stubble. one possibility is that with liberal use of tasers, confrontations escalated until lethal force was necessary.
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i will be the first to admit that this particular outcome -- we did not have the power to measure this outcome. only four cities provided data on officer injuries. nevertheless, we did not see a decrease in officer injuries. what is the summary of our research? there is a definitive risk for lethal arrhythmias. that rate is not 1 per 100,000. it is something much higher than that, and i would partly be in agreement with 3% to 5%. detectors are important. taser admits to not targeting the chest. there is an early increase in sudden deaths which may be preventable. then there is a low increase in risk. if you will allow me to
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editorialize a little bit as a physician, a researcher, and a taxpaying san franciscan, these are my recommendations. tasers may serve a useful role in law enforcement. i have the utmost respect for our officers to face dangers every day. a pragmatist obviously recognizes the benefit in these potential situations where lethal force may have otherwise been used. but policies should be designed to take into account that phasors -- tasers should only be deployed in situations where you would otherwise use lethal force. avoid a vector across the chest at all costs. avoid repeated shocks. the more time to pull the trigger, the more likelihood it will cause cardiac arrest. third, a relatively inexpensive antidote -- police officers are
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the early responders to cardiac arrest. if you are going to have a device that can potentially cause cardiac arrest, have the antidote available, which costs on the order of about a thousand dollars. that would be my final recommendation for using tasers. president mazzucco: thank you very much. commissioner hammer: thank you, doctor. welcome back. i've been a prosecutor for a trial where you were most -- one of the most impressive witnesses i've ever seen. the chemicals estoppel, which i appreciate very much. -- you came across as a thoughtful, which i appreciate very much. one of the things that came across clearly -- if the commission decides to go forward, i will not vote for it,
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but i will make sure every patrol car has one of those in them. >> i think that will go a long way. commissioner hammer: the other thing you pointed out that i would like to encapsulate -- the study did was an amalgam of department data. if i recall correctly, you said that there were departments that did not have an increase, and they averaged out to sixfold. can i ask you to speculate on what that might be? >> i think we did hear testimony from a woman from berkeley. some police departments had a more liberal use of policy on the taser/ it is in these liberal situations that you do not recognize the potential for vehicle outcomes, where it causes excess harm. if we have a careful policy in
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place where tasers are restricted in their use, we avoid tasering folks with cardiac condition, or over the chest, i think a lot of risks can be mitigated. commissioner hammer: in terms of your findings, you are not claiming cause and effect. it is that if you do not have tight oversight of officers to use them, you are likely to see these effects? >> that is correct. commissioner hammer: think you for coming. chief godown: i appreciate your presentation. real quick, if i can get my hands around this study -- i am kind of confused. prior to the implementation of tasers, there was one in 100,000 of sudden death. once the agency's implemented the taser, it was six in
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100,000. can you tell me that had anything to do with the taser? >> we cannot. this was not a clinical trial. we cannot ethically use a clinical trial. the only thing we can do is look at outcomes and perform statistical analysis of outcomes we see. there is no question that there was a significant, substantial increase in the outcome. you are right. were those six all due to the taser? i cannot answer that question. before the tasers were introduced, death rates were one in 100,000. afterward, they went up to six fold. it is the same city, demographic, police department. chief godown: officer involved shootings went up after implementation. you said they had more and more violent time during that time. we cannot tell me that had
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anything to do with tasers, correct? >> that is correct. this is a limitation of and epidemiological study. that is a valid criticism of the study. it was peer reviewed and published in "the american journal of cardiology." commissioner slaughter: thank you for your presentation. it is incredibly useful. if we could have a copy of the slides, it would be very useful for us, moving forward. one clarification and one question. when you are talking about one in 100,000, it is deaths? >> correct. commissioner slaughter: i did not realize you had worked on the braidwood commission. i am getting up to speed on this. i read portions of it over the weekend. i wondered if you agreed with the commission conclusion when
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it comes to how the weapon has been deployed, that our society is better with these devices in use them without them? >> i did not review that particular statement. are you asking me if i agree with that? i think if we had a very restrictive policy and we have potential mitigation in place, they probably do serve a useful role. >> one question that helps us evaluate these. could you talk a little bit about the value witting different studies? i have a stack of studies. there are lots of conflicting results. could you tell us really quickly how we figure out if they study is a quality study or a study we should pay less attention to? >> the commonly heard metaphor
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in academics is "publish or perish." for a study to be published, it has to be peer reviewed and published in a peer-reviewed journal. that is a standard that is the very minimum for to buy russian of the study, whether it has been published by a peer- reviewed journal. president mazzucco: we really have to move forward. >> i understand. i was at a meeting last night and the question came up about delirium. i was looking at the braidwood study, and there were several psychologists saying it was not a valid medical diagnosis and was used more frequently to absolves law enforcement. can you talk a little bit about that? >> unqualified that i am not a psychiatrist. delirium is a debated condition.
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i think some of the sudden deaths predating tasers were attributed to excited delirium. the idea is that subtexts are excited to death. it is a debated mechanism for how the subject guide. it could be cardiac arrhythmia. it was seen in subjects who were psychologically deranged. it is a situation where a taser could potentially increase that risk by further increasing the instability in the system. that is another potential mechanism, other than a direct captor of the heart. >> thank you for your service. we only have two speakers left. we will get into public, and very soon. mr. jack bryson, are you here? we may have only one more
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speaker. our last speaker will be alan gi hopper, director of police practice at the aclu of northern california. >> i'll give you my brief comments. >> perhaps we can do is as we get into public, we can work on fixing the audio. then you will get a chance to do that. >> 14 year-old kyle martinez
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looks normal until you see this. >> it is really painful. >> 18 staples and six stitches pieced her head back together after she was tasered. doctors told her family that one of the prongs went through kylie's skull and hit her brain. it happened last thursday, as her mother argued with her about pictures of herself on. the police department came and when they got there, kylie bolted for this park. >> i did not mean for my child to be injured. >> the police officer claims she tried to walk away, but he told her to stop. when he pulled out the taser, she ran out of fear.
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>> you do not go and take a 14- year-old child. >> the officer said he told her to stop warning and -- stop running and warned her about the taser. police say they
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>> the last moments captured by bystanders. she could not go into the baggage area or get a message to them. then he throws something. a security man appears. they need an interpreter.
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as they arrive, before they get there, the answer is yes. as the mounties approach, they ask if the man speaks english. for a moment, they try to talk to him but it is no good. he writhes and moans. the man behind the camera becomes a surrogate. they can his neck and his head